


By Any Other Name

by Leela



Category: Forever Knight
Genre: F/M, Romance, Vampires
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-28
Updated: 2013-07-28
Packaged: 2017-12-21 16:11:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,154
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/902260
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Leela/pseuds/Leela
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Miklos wants Janette, but so does Nick.</p>
            </blockquote>





	By Any Other Name

**Author's Note:**

  * For [skieswideopen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/skieswideopen/gifts).



> **Betas** : brightknightie, batdina
> 
>  **FKFicFest 2011 Recipient** : skieswideopen
> 
>  **Prompt** : Janette/Nick ~ Balancing competing demands

"Thrice bedamned aristos. Always think they're better than everyone else," Miklos muttered as he watched Nick Knight move through the Raven with his usual scorn for anyone who wasn't Janette DuCharme. Not that the former Nicolas de Brabant treated Janette much better than the rest of the rabble. 

She accepted Knight's treatment though, even encouraged it, and that always left Miklos with the taste of spoiled blood in his mouth. Janette deserved far better than a wannabe mortal who came and went as he pleased and expected her to be waiting for him every time he returned.

Not that her _Master_ was any better. The less said about Lacroix's sense of entitlement where Janette and even Nick were concerned the better, at least as far as Miklos was concerned.

"Miklos!" 

He dragged his attention away from Nick's possessive grasp of Janette's hand and glared at Briana. "What?"

Unlike the mortal waitstaff who had a depressing tendency to quail before him, Briana gave him a considering look and then said, "Whichever one you want, they're not for the likes of us."

"Don't presume to know anything about me." Miklos spun around and began to gather the ingredients required for the first drink on her current order.

"Stop fooling yourself." Her voice dropped into a range too low for the humans around them to hear. "We're irrelevant to them, no matter our age or power. They live in their own world, and the old Roman will never make room for another."

"And what of Nick's mortals?"

Briana made a dismissive sound. "Merely a passing fancy. He'd forget them in a heartbeat if Janette truly required it of him."

"Now who's fooling herself," Miklos said, drawing a pint of beer. "Nick would forsake her for humanity in an instant."

"And who would she forsake him for?"

Taken aback, Miklos stared at her. As she tilted her head, the lights splashed gold across her brown skin and drew attention to her collarbones and the long column of her neck. Centuries old mores rose within him and he was tempted to get a cloak and draw it around her shoulders, covering her from view. He shook them off in an eye-blink. Of all the vampires he knew, Briana would least appreciate that kind of attention.

Janette's laugh interrupted his thoughts, and he glanced towards the end of the bar. Nick was bending forward, whispering into Janette's ear. How could she still trust him? After everything that--

Miklos forced himself to look and focus on Briana's order. Counting off the drinks and making sure he'd filled them all was far less likely to lead to insanity than contemplating the incomprehensible reasons why Janette DuCharme continued to welcome Nick Knight into her life.

"Calm yourself." Briana leaned across the counter and tapped his cheek, directly beneath his left eye. "You know how Janette gets when we slip."

A growl rumbled through Miklos as he sought to re-establish control. When he reopened his eyes, Briana was heading back into the throng with a tray full of drinks and Janette was alone. Again. 

Miklos surveyed the patrons on the other side of his bar. All of them were taken care of; none of them needed what he had to offer, at least not for the moment. Perhaps, he thought, he should take care of the one person who never seemed to need anything.

@}>\--,--'-- 

Janette swept into the club an hour before opening, as she did every night. Her heels rang through the empty room, and her skirts rustled. Everything seemed to be in its place -- the chairs once more arranged around the tables, the alcohol displayed openly, the blood locked away.

One thing, however, was out of place: a sweet smell that didn't belong with the other familiar odours. Chains rattled against each other when she came to a sudden halt.

"Roses." She hissed the word like a curse. Her fangs descended, and she flew toward the source of the scent.

A single rose lay on the bar in front of a glass of her favourite _vin de sang_. The petals were a purple so dark that it would have looked black in the right lights to mortal eyes. 

Someone had come into her club while she was sleeping and left her a gift. But was it a promise or a threat? 

She picked up the rose and brushed the soft, velvet bloom against her nose. The fragrance was intense, but it was the familiar scent underlying it that made her tighten her fingers on the stem. A thorn sliced through her skin. A drop of blood fell into the glass, rippling the red surface.

Bringing her finger to her mouth, she sucked meditatively. An image of herself, nestled against Nick's side, flashed through her. Then her skin repaired itself, sealing the rest of the memory away. 

" _Merci_ ," she said, raising her glass to the empty room, and then she breathed in the rose's perfume once again.

@}>\--,--'-- 

Satisfaction curled through Miklos as he watched Janette. She carried his rose instead of her usual glass. The wine-dark rose that he'd braved the sunlight each day that week to leave for her. She'd smiled, danced, and flirted every night; she hadn't spent hours perched on a stool, watching life pass her by.

"You're a fool," Briana told him. 

"Perhaps," Miklos said, resting his elbows on the bar. "But she needed to be reminded that she has options. That others would make room in their lives for her if she glanced in their direction."

"And if she thinks they are from him?"

"From?" He didn't bother finishing the question, not when he looked up to see Nick Knight stalking across the Raven. Miklos made a disgusted sound. "She knows Nick better than that."

"I..." Briana sighed. She came to stand beside him and placed a hand on his shoulder. "Do you believe that or simply hope it?"

He had no answer for her. Not when Janette's smile changed as Nick approached, became deeper and more intimate. Not when she tapped his cheek with the rose Miklos had left for her.

"Nicolas," Janette said. "What brings you here tonight?" 

"You, of course." Nick kissed her lightly on the mouth and took up a position next to her, leaning against the bar. His closeness to Janette and his posture screamed of a possessiveness that made Miklos want to intervene.

"She means that much to you?" Briana's soft query interrupted Miklos's thoughts.

"She saved my life," Miklos said. He blinked away the memories of the mob that had chased him into the dawn, refusing to let them overwhelm him.

Briana squeezed his hand, bringing him all the way back to the present. After a brief hesitation, he turned his own over and returned the pressure. 

"Go," he said. "You have customers waiting." 

When she had disappeared into the crowd on the other side of his bar, he reached for the key to the blood safe.

@}>\--,--'-- 

The roses were from Miklos. Janette had no doubts about that. His scent tickled her nose every time she breathed in their perfume.

" _C'est ridicule_ ," she murmured. Even so, she couldn't help putting her glass down on the bar and picking up that night's rose. She could feel Miklos's eyes on her. 

Half his attention still on the two men dancing together -- one a vampire, the other a mortal -- Nick asked, "Is that what you think they are? Ridiculous?"

"I wasn't referring to Artur and Peter," Janette said. "Although they skate perilously close."

"Because of what they are?" 

She sighed. So typical of Nick to jump to a conclusion before he so much as began to think. Some days she was amazed that his intuitive leaps served him so well in his current career. Then again, she reminded herself, he was a master at defying expectations.

" _Non_ ," she said. "Because they cannot make up their minds. How many more weeks and months must they arrive separately and spend the night dancing around each other before they choose?"

Anger flashed through Nick's eyes. "Bringing someone across isn't always the answer," he hissed.

"Not everything comes down _that_ , Nicolas. At least not for some of us."

His gaze flicked between the couple on the dance floor and her glass of blood wine before returning to her. "Is there another choice for our kind?"

"There are always choices. Some are simply less... desirable than others." Janette shrugged, the slow lift of her shoulder that always drew Nicolas's eyes to the curve of her neck. 

His head dipped and the vertical line between his eyebrows deepened in the way it always did when he fought his instincts and desires. 

Janette smiled. He was close, so very close. It would be a simple matter to draw him in the rest of the way. A shiver went through her at the idea of committing herself to him, to the depth of feelings that he still held for her, so very long after they'd parted.

Chains clashed, and an argument broke out between Artur and his friends. They didn't raise their voices. At least not to a volume that would worry the mortals surrounding them. But Peter had his back to a table and Artur was standing between the mortal and the vampires.

With a feeling that was somewhere between relief and sadness, Janette went to handle the problem. She felt Nick and Miklos move into place behind her as she swept across the dance floor.

@}>\--,--'-- 

Monday nights were Miklos's favourite nights at the Raven. The club was open to vampires only. No mortals allowed inside. No need to lock away the blood or worry about appearances. 

Then there was the music. Every vampire who had ever been to the Raven had contributed to the Monday night collection. It stretched back and forth across the centuries and was played without heed to anything more than the DJ's whim. Her current choice was a sinuous melding of voice, stringed instrument, and drum that had everyone in the club moving, whether alone or with others.

Miklos leaned against a pillar, half-hidden behind the chains, and watched it all. Despite it being his night off, he kept an eye on the bar and the club. They could all survive without him, he knew; however he wasn't completely sure he could forgive himself if anything happened when he wasn't there.

"You work too hard." Janette was close enough that the combined scents of her _vin de sang_ and blood-red rose were almost overwhelming. 

And yet, Miklos could not do anything but turn towards her. Her hair, for once, was loose around her shoulders, permitted to be itself rather than twisted and shaped. 

"I'm not working," he said and returned his gaze to the dance floor.

"You're not playing either."

"Perhaps not."

"You should dance," she said. "The music demands it, _non_?"

"I don't always give in to every demand made of me."

Janette didn't respond. She stayed beside him, sipping her own drink. The music changed, slid into another Romany tune that called to a past he'd long since put aside. He shifted in place, and the rattle of the chains drew her attention back to him.

She reached up and took hold of his chin, drawing his head down and forcing him to look at her. He thought about closing his eyes and not obeying her. Then her eyes flashed gold, and he was caught in their trap as always.

"You need to treat yourself better, _mon ami_." The blood in his veins surged to meet the beat of hers, and she smiled at him.

"There's no one I wish to spend time with," he said, side-stepping the point she always tried to make. 

Her disapproval was tangible. "You cannot be sure of that until you've danced a few dances."

Shaking off her hold on him, Miklos followed the direction of her gaze to Briana. "No," he said. "Not with her."

"It doesn't always have to be a matter of the heart."

"Pot, kettle," he said, and she laughed as always at that awful joke. Because she knew as well as he did that neither of them were good at setting aside their desires and feelings.

"You know me too well." She took another sip, and her expression became serious. "No more roses. This one must be the last."

"As you insist."

"I have made my decision," she said.

There was nothing else to do, so he raised his glass to her in a toast. She lifted her own, and the _ting_ of their touch echoed around them for a moment until it was lost under the music. 

Returning his attention to the dance floor, Miklos adamantly did not watch her leave to join Nick Knight over by the bar. He ought to have been more disappointed at her decision, but somehow he knew it was the right one for both of them.

~fin~


End file.
